Zoocap

This part of the trip is always the strangest.  Getting somewhere is always hard, because there are all the impossible things that have to happen before.  You leave a place, and it is almost like closing up the little shop that is your life.  It takes a lot of effort to keep that life going, so when you leave it, it almost seems as though it might not be open when you get back, and all the things that were there have changed, and the people you know have decided to move.  So all that you have of that life is what you’re carrying, and at a point you have to look at it and decide that this is enough, this is plenty of material with which to make a new life.

It’s sometimes easier in Manhattan and sometimes not.  There are hotels, to be sure, at this site, and you know that the stay will be wonderful as always.  And in New York, they have everything, so if you decide you don’t have what you need to create a life, you can find materials to keep building.  But that also reminds you that it might be easier than you’d suspected to create your life, and that the years you put into it might have been easier if only you’d known that you didn’t need that much.  So you decide to go to a gallery and see how the other artists are doing this, how they are constructing their lives.

This part is where is becomes somehow magical.  There is a lot to see, and a lot of ideas, and this is exciting, because there are people here who are just like you, and you know that you can do this too.  This is, after all, exactly what you’re doing in your own city.  This gallery has video, and painting, and performance, and this is what you know, too.  At the same time, it’s a small pinch of jealousy that comes in, because you might be here, but you’re not, and the people here seem to be so decided about what they’re doing.  A half of a conversation later, and you start to sense the same fears and doubts that you have, but they’ve decided to continue anyway.  Exactly like you’ve done, and like you’re doing, and in spite of yourself, this is becoming sweet.

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